Writing — Page 20

A visit to Yosemite Valley, where Half Dome and El Capitan frame a landscape so dramatic it almost feels engineered, and the waterfalls are at their thunderous peak in late June.

A trip to Death Valley, the hottest and driest national park in the United States, where the alien beauty of salt flats, sand dunes, and painted badlands stretches in every direction.

Exploring Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, where Trail Ridge Road cuts through alpine tundra above 12,000 feet and elk wander through meadows at dusk.

Oregon's tallest waterfall drops 620 feet in two tiers along the Historic Columbia River Highway — the most visited natural site in the Pacific Northwest, and for good reason.

A 176-foot waterfall right next to the Historic Columbia River Highway, with a short trail to Ponytail Falls where you walk directly behind the cascade.

Idaho's Niagara — a 212-foot waterfall on the Snake River that's wider than Niagara Falls, hidden in plain sight in the middle of southern Idaho's high desert.

A roadside pull-off at 7,562 feet on Nevada Highway 431 with one of the best panoramic views of Lake Tahoe — two dozen parking spots, zero admission, infinite sky.

A trip to the Great Smoky Mountains, the most visited national park in the country, where layers of blue-hazed ridgelines stretch to the horizon and old-growth forest fills every hollow.

A perfectly flat expanse of salt stretching to the horizon in every direction — one of the most surreal landscapes in North America, where the ground looks like snow and the sky reflects in the surface like water.